At Newport every one labors under the disadvantage of being known,—­for the most part too well known.  How painful it must be to spend summer after summer in a world of reality, where the truth is so much more thrilling than any possible fiction that people are deprived of the pleasure of invention and the imagination falls into desuetude.  At Narragansett every one is veneered for the occasion,—­every seam, scar, and furrow is hidden by paint, powder, and rouge; the duchess may be a cook, but the count who is a butler gains nothing by exposing her.

The very conditions of existence at Newport demand the exposure of every frailty and every folly; the skeleton must sit at the feast.  There is no room for gossip where the facts are known.  Nothing is whispered; the megaphone carries the tale.  What a ghastly society, where no amount of finery hides the bald, the literal truth; where each night the same ones meet and, despite the vain attempt to deceive by outward appearances, relentlessly look each other through and through.  Of what avail is a necklace of pearls or a gown of gold against such X-ray vision, such intimate knowledge of one’s past, of all one’s physical, mental, and moral shortcomings?  The smile fades from the lips, the hollow compliment dies on the tongue, for how is it possible to pretend in the presence of those who know?

At Narragansett friends are strangers, in Newport they are enemies; in both places the quality of friendship is strained.  The two problems of existence are, Whom shall I recognize? and, Who will recognize me?  A man’s standing depends upon the women he knows; a woman’s upon the women she cuts.  At a summer resort recognition is a fine art which is not affected by any prior condition of servitude or acquaintance.  No woman can afford to sacrifice her position upon the altar of friendship; in these small worlds recognition has no relation whatsoever to friendship, it is rather a convention.  If your hostess of the winter passes you with a cold stare, it is a matter of prudence rather than indifference; the outside world does not understand these things, but is soon made to.

Women are the arbiters of social fate, and as such must be placated, but not too servilely.  In society a blow goes farther than a kiss; it is a warfare wherein it does not pay to be on the defensive; those are revered who are most feared; those who nail to their mast the black flag and show no quarter are the recognized leaders,—­Society is piracy.

Green’s Inn was cheery, comfortable, and hospitable; but then the season had passed and things had returned to their normal routine.

The summer hotel passes through three stages each season,—­that of expectation, of realization, and of regret; it is unpleasant during the first stage, intolerable during the second, frequently delightful during the third.  During the first there is a period when the host and guest meet on a footing of equality; during the second the guest is something less than a nonentity, an humble suitor at the monarch’s throne; during the third the conditions are reversed, and the guest is lord of all he is willing to survey.  It is conducive to comfort to approach these resorts during the last stage,—­unless, of course, they happen to be those ephemeral caravansaries which close in confusion on the flight of the crowd; they are never comfortable.